


I'm the Last Kid Standing

by musicalgirl4474



Series: Psychology terms are Great Batfamily Prompts [11]
Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Damian and knives, Gen, Gymnastics, The Flying Graysons, Tiny Damian
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-19
Updated: 2019-03-19
Packaged: 2019-11-24 07:24:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18162833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/musicalgirl4474/pseuds/musicalgirl4474
Summary: Social Facilitation- Improved performance due to another person being in the room on easy, well-learned tasks.Damian watches Grayson perform, and it's not what he had expected."Damian was suddenly aware that Grayson had mastered acrobatics in such a way that he would not have been out of place among the plethora of teachers his mother had lined up for him in his childhood."





	I'm the Last Kid Standing

Damian did not know what to make of Richard Grayson. Mother had always said that the ‘Robins’ were imposters, fake heirs, working to steal his father’s mantle. And yet, Grayson seemed wholly incapable of that kind of plotting. Todd and Drake seemed quite averse to him taking on the mantle of Robin; they saw him as a threat. But Grayson? He seemed perfectly content with training Damian, teaching him new skills.

That was another thing his mother had neglected to mention. The first Robin was the most accomplished acrobat in the world, and was not shy about it. Damian’s father had long ago installed a gymnasium in the manor, complete with gymnastics equipment (even a few aerial aides, such as the trapeze). Damian did not spend much time there; why use mundane equipment made for an ordinary, soft human being when he could use enhanced training techniques in the cave with tools available only to a few? But Grayson was often to be found in that room, even in the early morning, when he ought to have been resting.

Damian had been on the way to the kitchen in order to quiet his inconvenient hunger when he noticed that the gym door was open. He was curious. (A failing; he should be no more curious than necessary, going out of his way to satisfy curiosity was indulgence.) Who was up so early- still awake? Maybe it was Drake, the boy seemed unable to sleep. Hoping to get one-up on the fake son, Damian moved silently into the room. It wasn’t Drake.

Grayson was moving with an unnatural fluidity, seeming to defy gravity altogether. He lept from trapeze to trapeze, bar to bar, as if the whole gymnasium was just one large piece of equipment. The uneven bars swayed slightly with Grayson’s momentum as he flipped his body mid-air and gripped back onto the top bar. Damian could see the shine of sweat on Grayson’s skin, proof of exertion not to be found in his even breaths and smooth movements. This was art in the air. Damian was suddenly aware that Grayson had mastered acrobatics in such a way that he would not have been out of place among the plethora of teachers his mother had lined up for him in his childhood. The best in the world.

Damian settled for a moment to observe, noticing the man’s posture as he leapt about. The pointed toes would be useless in a fight, but perhaps helped streamline his body. The slight arch to his back seemed to curve him in the air, taking him higher to grab the pair of rings hanging from the high ceiling. His legs stayed tightly together, held straight as if they were simply an extension of his torso.

Grayson seemed to briefly touch the higher trapeze before he was suddenly turning through the air; one, two, three, four flips before grasping onto the other trapeze, which swing high with momentum. He stays on that trapeze, waiting out some of the higher arcs before turning himself upside down, hanging by his knees. He hangs there, eyes closed, expression open and entirely free. He looks so vulnerable. Damian feels himself itching with the fact that a potential target is unarmed, unexpecting, and unseeing. Now would be a perfect moment to strike; a dagger thrown or arrow loosed, and he would be one step closer to being father’s only heir.

“Good morning Damian,” came a voice from above. Damian did not jump, did not show his surprise and consternation at being caught in his hiding place. Grayson’s eyes were still closed as the trapeze slowed, but his face was angled toward him. “Did you enjoy the show?” Ah, yes. Dick Grayson, the circus brat. Damian supposed that even the glitter of his father’s money couldn’t take that away.

“It was not horribly boring,” he allowed, moving from the darkness.

“I don't perform the quadruple flip often,” Grayson continues, dopey look still plastered on his face. “It would have given my identity away when I was Robin; the Flying Graysons were the only act in the world that ever did it. It’s very niche.”

“I could do it.”

“You could, if I taught you and you do the proper stretches to limber you. You’re so compact, all muscle and bones.”

-Tt- “I understand the bodily theory of flips.”

“And I’ve yet to see you do more than one at a time.” Grayson’s just hanging now, hair dangling as he angles his neck to keep Damian in his line of sight. “I’m not letting you up here until I’m sure you’re not going to hurt yourself trying to prove something you don't need to prove. No one can be the best at everything, no matter what your mother may have told you.”

Grayson doesn’t know anything. Mother had never said that he would know everything there was to know in the world. But he would master every fighting style. Even something as frivolous as Grayson’s flips could prove useful in distracting an opponent. Damian glared at where the man hung, still totally vulnerable up in the air, with the only place to go being the ground.

He stalked away to the kitchen, hand tight on the knife sheathed on his forearm.


End file.
